Behavioral Health Services for Children, Youth, and Families
County of San Diego (County) Behavioral Health Services offers many programs that help children, youth, and families with mental health or substance use needs.
These programs are run by local organizations and focus on serving children and youth up to age 21 who have Medi-Cal or no health insurance.
Programs
Click the button below to view the complete printable directory of all behavioral health services for children, youth, and pregnant and parenting women.
Explore the webpages listed below to find additional youth
services within the following service categories:
School-Based Services for Children and Youth
For information about services at schools, visit our School-Based Services webpage.
Student Wellness Resources
The Student Wellness Resources webpage is designed for middle and high school students. It provides free online and in-person tools to support mental health and overall well-being.
Specialized Resources
- Early Childhood Resources support healthy growth and development for children ages 0-5.
- Family Urgent Response System (FURS) offers immediate 24/7 phone or in-person help for current and former foster-involved youth up to age 21 and their families.
- Short-Term Residential Therapeutic Programs (STRTPs) provide structured care to foster youth to help them build skills to transition to a community-based or family care setting.
-
Therapeutic
Behavioral Services (TBS) offers one-on-one behavioral
coaching for youth up to age 21 who are facing emotional challenges
or stressful life changes.
- Next Move Community-Based Outpatient Program provides behavioral health services to youth up to age 21 who have recently left a detention facility or are at risk of justice system involvement.
Other Resources
- Youth Mental Wellness Practice provides free resources to maintain good mental health or improve well-being for mental health challenges.
- Own Your Mindset provides tools to help you check in with yourself and loved ones, as well as ways to reach out if you need support.
- Talk It Out SD offers ways to start conversations if you’re worried about suicide for yourself or others.
- Never a Bother is a youth-created campaign that has resources on how to support yourself, a friend, or someone in your care who is having thoughts of suicide.
- It’s Up to Us has resources on mental health, suicide prevention, alcohol and substance use.
- San Diego Opioid Project provides education on the risks of fentanyl and how to use and find naloxone locally to prevent overdose deaths.
Community Toolkit
Expand the library of outreach materials below for community use.
App-Based Support
Not sure where to start?
Call or text 9-8-8 or dial 1-888-724-7240 to speak to someone who can help find the right service for you or someone you care about. Both numbers are operated 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with support available in over 200 languages. For more information visit Get Help Now or All Services. If you are experiencing an emergency, please call 9-1-1.


